The Internet connection in this room keeps going in and out. I keep trying to reconnect, sometimes with success, sometimes without. Eventually I may have to get my dad to look at it. But I’d have to clean my room first. He’d get mad if there wasn’t any room to move around. Also, I don’t know what he’d say if he saw the Jian Ghomeshi poster on my wall… :rolleyes:
haha.
At least there is a computer in the other room that I can use if/when I have to.
Are you my seventeen-year old daughter? And is Jian Ghomeshi just code for Aaron Tveit?
Wait. Never mind. I notice your location is given as Montreal, and we all know it’s impossible to put an inaccurate response in the location field.
Merry Christmas.
Regards,
Aaron Tveit’s future father-in-law, apparently.
I had to google Aaron Tveit to find out who he was. Heh. 
Merry Christmas to you too,** kaylasdad99**.
Aaand now back to cleanin’ the old room.
Welp, that’s it. I’m old. I don’t know who any of these crazy moon people are.
I’m going back to my rocking chair. You kids better stay off my damn lawn.
Last year, my brother, his wife and two little girls gave me a wall calendar.
I gave him a gift card to Home Depot ($25) plus a trinket; the wife got a handspun, hand knit shawlette ($25 gets you a braid of fiber to spin); each little girl got a handknit skirt ($25-50 for yarn, plus labor).
And the wall calendar wasn’t even one I’d pick out for myself if I were picking out wall calendars.
I was SOOOOO pissed and hurt. I’m still a little resentful-- I get that it isn’t likely they’ll spend as much on me (one person) as I spend on them collectively (four persons). And I get that the handknits cost more for the yarn/fiber than a non-crafty person might guess.
I never called or emailed to fuss, because I didn’t want a “well, maybe we just shouldn’t exchange presents” response-- or else one which suggested that I should buy for the kids, but no one should be expected to buy for adults who can buy their own toys.
(I know there are families where buying presents only for kids is the norm-- I can’t stand the idea. For one thing, it makes me think only kids are valued/loved. For another, while the expectations for how much I spend are reduced, the fact that no money is expected to flow back toward me is just wrong).
And really, we’re not a family where large sums of money are spent at Christmas. Mom’s getting a stove this year, because she apparently needs one, but many years nothing nearly that expensive has been given.
This year? I cut back on the knitting projects-- one scarf, one hat . . . and intended to cut back on the dollars-- some success-- brother isn’t getting a gift card. But we haven’t exchanged presents yet, and I don’t expect to get mine from them for another week. Which is kind of a problem, because of the anxiety that remembering what a crappy gift I got last year is creating.
Although I bet part of my problem right now is PMS.
Mini-er rant than the above:
Dear Aunt:
I really don’t think that the cats are going to decide to open the present from me on their own-- there isn’t anything smelly in it. Please just open it and call me and tell me it’s awesome, even if you secretly think it’s dumb.
Or even just ask me what it is-- then tell me it’s awesome.
(It’s a felted cat toy).
Darn, the skin on my hands is cracking. One finger in particular, probably because I tore a chunk off it a few weeks ago and it was bandaged up for a while. Boo.
My hands are in dreadful shape. Cracks and roughness all over, plus I have split fingertips on three fingers on the left hand, and two on the fight. At least two of which aren’t healing because they’re infected. 
Someone suggested “Zinn’s Crack Crème” to me. Some sort of herbal based remedy that a lot of people swear by, or so I’m told.
Anybody have any experience with it? I’m about willing to try extract of mandrake root harvested under a waning moon…nothing else has worked so far.
My mother is all KINDS of interested in my medical stuff, despite the boundaries that crosses. She starts telling me about the Rx that one of her friend’s daughters is taking, a nominal friend/acquaintance of mine, and I ask her to please stop, then ask her again and again, tell her to please change the subject because she just won’t stop, that I’m uncomfortable having this conversation.
“{name} was ok telling you about what she was taking!”
Me: yes. She told me directly. That’s her right. But telling me about someone else’s medical history and prescriptions fourth hand… "
“Oh. There’s one of your mood swings again, you’re so angry.”
Eureka I really want to hear more about your fibers. Was the end result as soft and smooshy as it sounds?
I do very fussy needle work. I love going into shops and touching the fibers, I’ve always thought that spinning and knitting would be relaxing if not for that time that I tried using a drop spindle in a room full of cats.
If this isn’t a pattern on their part, I’d wait until you get the thank you message. If you always give them thoughtful hand made stuff and they always give you thoughtless gifts, change your plan.
Use cheap yarn and easy patterns. This way, they will still get the gifts you want to give, but you won’t invest as much time and love into them.
ETA forgot to bitch about other part of mom convo: she really REALLY wants to go clothes shopping with me… Specifically, to take ME clothes shopping. (Get the subtle difference?) I told her, I know there are awesome post holiday sales right now but I dislike clothes shopping under the best of circumstances and really, these are not the best of circumstances right now.
I’m approaching my mid 30s and have never liked clothes shopping so this should not exactly be news to her. I tolate it with good humor under the best of circumstances, we had a nice time out seveeral weeks ago which she seems to have re-interpreted as “bestest friends forevah!” But right now during the rah-rah holiday season I just don’t have the patience. So she immediately went all “oh mood swings! You must have been drinking!”
I swear she could give Mother Theresa a kickin’ substance abuse problem.
Our moms know each other? Although I tend to say my mom could make Mother Theresa beat children.
Actually, I was wondering when did I get a sister slightly younger than my youngest brother… Mom, is there something you forgot to tell us?
Whee! Convinced the in-laws to keep the girls for a couple of days, so that my son and dad and I can make a final push on finishing the house and starting the move. Last week’s ladylike tiny sneezes and mild sniffles have turned into a kill-me-now, full-blown upper respiratory infection. Ain’t nobody got time for that!
mrAru gave me his cold … now I have a scorchingly bad sore throat.
purplehorseshoe you deserve a medal for not letting your head spin 'round Exorcist style as you remind her that your life has been pulled to shreds this last year, and what she needs to do back the hell off and take a supporting and quiet role for a while. A long damned while.
Hang in there (( ))
Yeah, purplehorseshoe, I wish some of us Dopers could have a nice chat with your mom…but my advice to you is, ignore her. And get a mantra you can repeat in your head when she’s being like that. Maybe, “Dopers think you are nuts, mom.” Or “Dopers think you’re a bitch, mom.” Or “mood swing my ass.”
Using cheap yarn and easy patterns punishes ME the knitter far more than it does them the recipients. This year’s hat was much less expensive and less time-consuming than last year’s skirt–because it used so much less yarn.
(Also, while last year’s skirts were knit with love in every stitch, the shawl for the sis-in-law was a finished object before I decided to give it to her. Sometimes the making of the thing is an end in itself, and then I’m perfectly happy to give it away).
And finally-- pattern on their part? The wall calendar was by far the suckiest gift they’ve given me. And a few years ago they gave me a two year subscription to a knitting magazine-- that was wonderfully extravagent. The year in between? A pair of fancy socks for hiking. (To go with the hiking boots my parents were buying me. So a good, thoughtful gift that I didn’t especially want. Still don’t have the boots (because I hate shoe shopping), have worn the socks–nice, cozy hiking socks.).
So it’s hard to guess what they might give this year. If they asked Mom for ideas, she didn’t ask me for ideas to give them.
By the way, I have used a suspended spindle in a room with a cat. Cat and I had a discussion-- he could sniff my sweatshirt, and chew on my elbow, but NOT sniff the spindle or the fiber that was being spun. Cat lives at an LYS-- he chases/steals the occasional yarn ball, but is otherwise good with fiber.
My two cats are good about not bothering me as I am knitting but unattended yarn is considered a cat toy.
Eureka I came in here to say that cheap yarn is no fun to knit with. I gave someone the yarn label with the socks for the washing information but forgot to remove the price tag, and he said OMG I will never wear these socks. NO I said, they are meant to be used. And dammit I pick the yarn that’s pleasant to knit with, so ignore the price. Then I told him I got a discount. Sigh. (By the way are you on Ravelry? in the SDMB group? as Eurekas? We need to get that group going.)
ETA and I hope you get a magazine subscription this year and not a calendar.
My cat will leave every project alone for months at a time, and then suddenly in the middle of a tricky turn or something that involves special attention to counting, the yarn must die.
And I kind of like using cheap yarn for presents. Lots of it washes up nice and soft, and I’m usually giving it as a scarf or hat that’s going to get lost, stepped on, washed without care of instructions, chewed on by dogs, dragged behind a backpack on the school bus, etc. I save the expensive stuff for the specialer projects.