Thanksgiving in Pictures

Thanksgiving dinner was great. For the rest of the day, I was very tired and very, very full – but not too tired for a little knitting and a game of scrabble.

10 Things I Am Thankful For Right Now

1. My Family – Some of my paternal relatives are here for Thanksgiving, all the way from Okemos, Michigan (in the Lansing area). Although my family got to see them this summer when they went to Michigan for my Aunt's wedding, I was at NYSSSA, so I haven't seen them in a while. Even when they are playing video games and screaming or playing the euphonium, I love them anyway.

2. My Friends – I love them. In my experience, I am not good at making friends, but the ones I have mean so much to me, they are some of my very favorite people. They are the ones that know me best and still like me even when I am mean or grumpy or sad. That's pretty special.
3. Music – It's difficult to express how much I love music. I honestly cannot fathom what my life would be like if I didn't love music, especially if I didn't sing. At NYSSSA, I learned about how much music meant to me, it turns out, it means a lot. I think the reason I made such connections with people there is because we all had an understanding with each other, that music wasn't just a thing for us, it was the thing. Only someone else who loves music and singing as much as I do could understand.
4. Rowing – Rowing is the only sport I've ever been good at, and basically the only thing I do that makes me feel physically strong and healthy. Also, some of my best friends row. I love the Niskayuna crew, it's practically a family.
5. Where I Live – First and foremost, Niskayuna is a suburb, one that only exists because of the creation of a little thing called General Electric. However, Niskayuna and the Schenectady area are a pretty wonderful place. Schenectady gets a bad rap, but it has been improving so much recently and in the past week, I have been downtown quite a bit and I love it. Mot to mention the lovely trees in my own backyard and Central Park just a mile or so away. I ♥ NY.

6. Knitting – I am very thankful that my mom taught me how to knit when I was young. Even though she taught me to knit in a mostly-unknown mystery Scandinavian style (no, I am not Scandinavian). I love knitting, it's a great way to pass the time and I love having things that nobody else has.

7. Being an American – More so than in recent years. Yes we can! (Not to mention all of the obvious plusses, for one, being able to eat a meal like this, even for only one day a year.)
8. NYSSSA – Yeah, I talk about NYSSSA a lot. I actually had planned not to mention it in this post, but if I'm being honest, it is definitely one of the things I am most thankful for. It corresponds with why I am so thankful for friends and for music and just unifies them perfectly. (Bam. Homophony.) It was truly the best experience of my life and I loved every minute of it. Honestly, I could've spent the rest of my life there and been a pretty happy girl.
9. My Wreck This Journal – I highly recommend buying one of these. as a gift or for yourself. It's a very welcome change from my very controlled non-art doing (I couldn't fit an art class in to my schedule) life. It's also just a very fun thing to do when I am bored and need something to do. So, without further ado:

Assignment 28: What day could be better to do this assignment? I ate so much food, so there's a lot of variety. Go to the photos page to see all of the tags, which say what the foods are.
10. Photography – My digital camera is probably my most prized possession (it's up there with my hand-knits and my iPod). It's just a point and shoot, but I use it all the time and I love taking photos. Most of what I know about photography, I learned from my mom (who minored in photography), everything else I taught myself. For me, it's really fun to capture the beautiful things around me, and photos are great keepsakes of course.


Happy Thanksgiving :) Adios.

Assignment 25: After Washing

In case you're getting bored with this, don't fret! Variety will be back soon! Adios.

Assignment 25 - 27

Assignment 25 – This is obviously just the first stage of the assignment. I will probably post the results of this on it's own. Actually, it's probably being washed in the pocket of my jeans right now, so that should be pretty soon.
Assignment 26 – This one is pretty straightfoward. I borrowed pens from different people, I tried to get a range of colors.
Assignment 27 – I'm pretty sure the spine was already cracked, and leaving this page blank wasn't exactly difficult.

Assignments 19-24

Assignment 19 – I enjoyed this one, a lot of glue went in to it's production. However, this page is really thick and heavy. And don't tell mi hermanito that I stole one of his legos!
Assignment 20 – A simple one that Gabby did. She crumpled the journal during lunch... without warning!
Assignment 21 – Mom "dribbled" some coffee on here (while I was at the orthodontist and without asking) and I poured on some of my hot cocoa.
Assignment 22 – Please don't think worse of me for this one!
Assignment 23 – I love love love this one. I used oil pastels (Crayola) and I really love how it came out.
Assignment 24 – I used knitting needles to scratch it up while I was at a baby-sitting job. And yes, I am knitting something now. I have been knitting quite a bit recently (my wrist has been bothering me lately as well, that's probably why). I am making yet another pair of socks. I am very happy with them thus far. Adios!

Assignments 14-18

Assignment 14 - It had been a very long time since I had done anything with my Wreck This Journal, so I wanted to get it started again with something easy and quick. This was just what the doctor ordered. I used a sponge, one of those with a rough side for stuff that gets really stuck on, it worked better than I thought it would.
Assignment 15 - My friend Gabby loved helping me out with assignments before, so she got a hold of my journal and took care of this one. First, she dumped vitamin water all over it and then she drew on it with makeup.
Assignment 16 - I traced everything in the outer pockets of my backpack (except trash, which I threw out). Not to self: it's really hard to trace a necklace and ribbon
Assignment 17 - This one was weird, it doesn't look like my hand-writing at all, it's like a little kid! In case you can't read what I wrote, it says "I am not optimistic about the legibility of this message."
Assignment 18 - This one was a lot of fun. I cut the words from a few issues of Nick Mag, it's a favorite of mine to use for collages because you can count on it having a lot of variety in the lettering. I picked random words, the size and color were more important to me than the actual words (I just didn't want to use a word more than once).

By the way, I am already finsihed with Assignment 23, I just didn't want to post all of them at one time. Adios!

Creative Energy

I've been feeling very creative lately. Now that I think about it though, I'm usually doing something artistic. This summer, I spent most of my time at chorus camp and when I was watching other people sing, chances are I was making a friendship bracelet while doing it (all in all, I think I made about seven or eight friendship bracelets while I was at NYSSSA, and a made a few more before and after I was there). I made so many, that I got to the point where I could do them without even looking and finish a bracelet in one or two nights. That was in July and early August.
Then, for whatever reason, I just stopped. I didn't make too many more friendship bracelets, I wasn't working on any knitting projects, I didn't do anything with my Wreck This Journal for ages, and I certainly wasn't blogging. I got so caught up in school and rowing, and anything else that I just didn't make the time to do it (not that I had much, if any, extra time).
Now the rowing season is over, and I have been just spitting out art. I started doing my Wreck This Journal again (I'll save that for a separate post in the near future) and I've been knitting up a storm. I started and finished a pair of socks in time for Socktoberfest and seamed a pair of socks that had been sitting around for ages.

In between those two projects, I re-visited an old favorite project of mine, the Horizontal Scarf from Teen Knitting Club.


I had made one of these a long time ago in a few purple and red yarns. I remember that it took me forever (this one took me just a few days) but I wore it all the time. It eventually got pretty ratty, but I really loved that scarf and people always commented on it. I like this one just as much, if not more. I really like the mix of colors (I liked it so much, I actually just modeled a friendship bracelet after it) and the length, which I thought would be too short, ended up being just about right. Plus, this one is knit in slightly more durable yarns, so it's warmer and I think it will wear better. All of this creativity is definitely improving my mood as well. I'm happier than I've been in months, even though I'm still missing my friends from the summer quite a bit (but lets not get on that slightly weepy tangent...) Adios!

You've Been Missed

I've decided that it's time to start blogging again. Expect a post tomorrow, for real. :)