Here’s what I’ve been doing instead of paying attention to you.

And updating my Etsy shop.

I will resume paying attention to you soon. Ish. Goodness I’m a crappy blogger.

By then it was time for dinner. We headed to our favorite sushi restaurant. I hate to recommend it, because I want it to stay the little hole-in-the-wall restaurant it is, but since we’re all friends here I’ll tell you. If you want great sushi in Portland, skip the snobby Saburo’s and Mio restaurants and go to Sushi Mania. It looks seedy and a little strip-jointy from the outside, but the inside is small and cozy and the waitstaff are always adorable and helpful. They have fresh, well-cut sushi and some very unusual rolls. I can’t recommend their signature Blow Blow roll (even though I love the name) but I can’t say enough about their negihama roll. Dear lord, just typing it makes me crave it. We stuffed ourselves with sushi and edamame, and I had myself an entire bottle of sake. We picked up a Snickers cake on the way home (SO YUMMY. SO BAD FOR YOU.). I wallowed contentedly for a little while and then went to bed full of sushi, sake, and cake. I managed to read the preface to the Gibson-Roberts book before falling asleep. Happy day. The only way it could have been a better day is if I had done all these things IN SCOTLAND. I’m talkin’ to you, Carla.

My plans for today, my actual birthday, involve a lot of sitting around in my pajamas, maybe a load of dishes, dying up myself and my kids with some henna, and a ton of fiber dying and spinning. However, it’s already noon, so I should probably get started with that. But first, here’s a tribute to myself (shameless!) by looking back a little: (cue Lifetime Television music)

30 YEARS AGO: I was born in a military hospital in Okinawa, Japan, to a Chinese woman and a Caucasian-American man. On the same day, another baby was born to a Japanese woman and a Caucasian-American man. In a scenario straight out of a bad comedy movie, this other couple would give their baby the same name as my own (both fathers were even from the same tiny county in Montana–crazy!). The mothers of course became confused at one point and accidentally switched babies, caring for and nursing them for nearly an entire day before a nurse caught the switch and the infants were returned to their proper families. I would spend many years hoping the switch had actually never happened and that my real parents would eventually come for me.

20 YEARS AGO: I was a small, skinny, painfully shy girl. That’s what happens when you have insane parents and a highly dysfunctional upbringing. I was living in Okinawa again, which I loved, but my family was having nervous breakdowns and self-induced crises one after the other, which I did not love. It was a tough time for me. My parents, in a surge of parental guilt, took me to a very fancy French restaurant for my birthday and fed me steak and virgin Shirley Temples. My infant brother tried to choke to death in his sleep during the dinner and ruined the night. I did, however, have “Happy Birthday” sung to me by a mariachi band (in a French restaurant? in Japan? WTF? just go with it). Three days later I went to Tokyo for a month-long homestay trip which was awesome and scary.

10 YEARS AGO: I was in Missoula, Montana, and in my junior year of college. I was recently married to a silly, sweet, perfect boy and had given birth to our first daughter in January. I was working at a sushi restaurant as a sushi chef (awesome) but we were dead broke and had lots of trouble making ends meet. To make matter worse, my father would be diagnosed with lymphoma later that year, and my mother would undergo thyroid surgery. Tough times. I don’t remember what I did for my 20th birthday, but I’m sure it was humble due to our money troubles.

5 YEARS AGO: That silly boy and I had been living in Japan for a year with our two girls, this time in Akita Prefecture, Japan. I was teaching English in a Japanese junior high and we were having a pretty good time. We were not financially secure, but we did well enough and got to run around Japan, seeing and doing some pretty amazing things. For my 25th birthday, we drove to Akita City for some shopping, a movie, and dinner at our favorite Thai restaurant in the world (haven’t been able to find a better Naan since). During this year, I would spend a lot of time soaking in hot springs, eating yakisoba and takoyaki, making onigiri every Wednesday for my daughter’s bento, going to my shamisen lessons, and exploring hidden places looking for Jizo and Inari shrines. A very good year.

1 YEAR AGO: We had just moved to Portland. We dropped the kids off with my sister and went to a couple different yarn shops. I don’t think I bought anything. Went to a movie, then dinner at Kalga Kafe (good, but too dark and noisy). My birthdays are mostly about eating a good dinner because I’m a little food-obsessed.

I’m really happy to be turning 30, mostly because I really sucked at being 20-something. Thanks for being here for this milestone.

First there was the rinsing of the fiber.

Then there was the drying of the fiber. (Pardon my dark bathroom.)

And even more drying....

And even more drying…. It seemed like a never-ending dry-a-thon. Finally dry, I have begun to spin! The Tour is half over and I’ve finally just started. Lovely.

Big Bad Wolf merino roving

Gretel merino roving

Gingerbread House merino roving

Beast merino roving

I’ve been working very hard these past few weeks in my scant spare time after work dying these colors and others. I’m very happy to say that I’ve opened up a new shop over on Etsy. Apparently I couldn’t stay away from the dye pot. Some of you have ordered my yarns in the past, and I may offer yarn again in the future, but for now I’m going to focus on spinning fiber. The shop has been up for less than a day, and I’ve already received some great feedback.

I’ll post my Tour De Fleece progress soon!

First thing I joined: The Arkham Horror Summer League. The husband and I enjoy board games–not your Target-store type of game like Monopoly, Scrabble, and Trivial Pursuit (although those are indeed fine games). We enjoy games that tend to be known only by people who are into board games, and not by the mainstream crowd: Kill Dr. Lucky, Carcasonne, Citadels, Arkham Horror, and so on. Fun stuff! We’ve played our first game of the league and did well.

Second thing I joined: Le Tour De Fleece. It’s like the Knitting Olympics, but for spinning. I’ve long wanted to spin up a tweed-like yarn, so that’s my self-challenge–to spin up enough tweedy yarn to knit myself a sweater. I started on it today with a little bit of goo:

Acid dye. Tasty!

I have a little natural brown wool, but not enough for a sweater-sized project. However, I do happen to have plenty of white merino (*cough* 28 pounds worth *cough*). I recently dyed up a batch of merino that turned out really gorgeous, with a browny-purpley color. I was attempting to get a similar shade with this dye.

This wool says, “Dye me, baby!”

Mmmm...fresh out of the oven.

See how the color separated a little bit after cooking? This uneven dying will give the finished yarn added visual depth with a semisolid appearance. Perfect!

And, I like these socks.

Next time: Jarrett makes progress

PS to Beth: Yes, that is a tattoo on her arm–a temporary press-on tattoo of some evil-looking spider. That’s my girl!

I am not a seamstress/tailor/what have you.

My eldest daughter has been very keen on learning to sew. I have had a nice sewing machine for a little while now, because I was once keen to sew. It passed. I was better. But she wanted to learn, which means I have to learn, too. I looked around for a book that would be good for beginners like us, and found Sew What! Skirts: 16 Simple Styles You Can Make With Fabulous Fabrics. We made the first skirt in the book, an A-line drawstring skirt.

It wasn’t hard, it was just….fiddly. I hated it. I love knitting, an activity which is the pinnacle of fiddliness. Tens of thousands of stitches formed one at a time in order to create a garment. Sewing is just measure, cut, sew, but I found it too fiddly. I hated pressing the fabric. I hated pinning the fabric. I hated trying to sew a straight freaking line. I hated ripping out the seam and doing it again. I hated finishing the seams. I just disliked it. My daughter, however, loved it, and she is welcome to continue sewing and I will simply provide emotional support and very occasional technical assistance. The most frustrating thing of all? Her skirt came out better than mine. Her seams are straighter, neater, and nicer. Her rickrack-edged pocket looks tidy and cute while mine is a big, thready mess. Her seams are finished and I just didn’t bother. Her drawstring opening is carefully reinforced and I crapped mine out in about 30 seconds (which shows). So I’m not a seamstress, but my daughter is. I’m glad.

We picked out clearance fabrics from Joann for this first foray, as we didn’t expect to turn out anything wearable. I don’t normally choose to wear pink, but I thought this fabric was cute. Maybe my daughter can reclaim it to make herself something.

(Check out my little fat roll. So. Funny.)

(My daughters are too pretty, if I say so myself. This worries me to no end.)

I also love this picture. The girl looks exactly like me, except her hair is a little longer. I even have the same mole in the same spot and the same teeny mouth. I’m going to need this picture. And the artist lives in Portland too! Supporting local artists–awww yeah.

Have you guys been to Etsy lately? Holey moley! I want to buy everything on there. Where did all these talented crafters come from? And why are they tempting me with their pretty things?!?!?

Second: I have nothing particularly exciting to post. Lemme think….nope. Nothing. I was, however, able to take some photos of some handspun I’ve done in the past months (honestly can’t remember if you’ve already seen some of these) and progress on the Jarrett sweater from Rowan Vintage Knits. I’ve completed the back and most of the left front. It’s a very basic sort of sweater, but knit out of awesome. Seriously, Rowan’s Scottish Tweed DK is the only commercial yarn I will every knit with again. Well, maybe not, but I do like it that much. I’m using color 29(?) Autumn. It’s grey, but then it’s green, then it’s grey again. The tweed bits are delightful. There is just one thing bad about this yarn: it triggers my eczema on the parts of my fingers that come into contact with the yarn while knitting. But I’m not about to let a silly medical condition get in between me and this yarn, so I knit with a latex glove on my right hand (which is the one that is most affected). Sexy? No. Effective? Yes.

Anyway, here be handspun and Jarrett.