lolajl: June 2005 Archives

The past weekend I took an iconography workshop with Colette Kalvesmaki, a family friend who is an iconographer. You may be asking, what are icons?

Well, an icon is a sacred image, usually two dimensional, which may depict a person (or persons), as well as special events in the Bible and saints' lives. If you've seen programs about Russia on tv where they talk about churches, you may have seen paintings of Jesus Christ, Theotokos (Virgin Mary), saints. We Orthodox Christians do not worship icons; rather, these help us to contemplate the divine and spiritual.

If you look closely at an icon, you'll see that there is a certain style that may look odd, such as big eyes, long, pointed fingers, etc. There's a reason for that - to show the otherworldy nature of the divine. You don't have to be a talented artist to create an icon, but you do have to understand the theology since that is a big part of iconography.

I finally found that cable for downloading pictures. So, here's a good one of the jewelry that I bought to wear with my saree. This is a really tough jewelry to take pictures of, because of the color. The beads reflect light, so we had to play around with the background setting. Placing it on white played havoc with the flash - either it would come out too bright or too dark. Bruce tried putting it on this white aran sweater; while it came out fairly decent it is too jarring to see the aran pattern against the necklace decoration. Hopefully it will be better when I wear the sari.

I've been prowling the web for a good video on how to wear one. There are tons of illustration out there on the web, the ubiquitous set of purple-colored sari illustration which seems to have become the default set of reference on many website with an obligatory “how to wear a sari” page. I do have a video, but it is not well-put together. There's one video from this website I've known about, but for some reason it isn't there anymore even though the link to the video still exists. Wish I'd been able to save it when it was still available.

This morning I tried putting it on and it didn't quite come out well. I need someone there to tell me if I'm doing it right and Bruce is at work right now. Hopefully there will be time this weekend to practice; I'm taking an iconography class (which is why I'm home right now).

Here's what I don't want to end up looking like. Helen Mirren was wearing this as a favor for a charity marketing products made by poor Bangladeshi women (I think). I know she means well, but frankly, this just doesn't look great. See how uneven the front is? And the pinning of the pallu is haphazard. She should have gotten a lesson or two from an Indian shop, or gotten her personal assistant to hire an Indian woman to work with her on putting the outfit together for the event. I like being neat, and I know I will be very self-conscious if I know I don't have it on the right way. Looking at pictures of beautiful Indian women with flat abdomen doesn't help matters any further.

Soon I've got to go to the iconography class; need to pick up something to eat for lunch and I must remember to pack my camera so I can show y'all what I did today. I should have some uninterrupted time to myself as Bruce is off to a bachelor party tonite (no, it's not going to be a wild event where women strip down to the bare; that's for when his brother Rick comes out here next month to spend ten days with us . . . eeek!). So it will be good to catch up with stuff. I know I could get some cleaning done . . . but I don't feel like it.

This weekend was a busy one. Earlier last week I had spent quite some time calling around Indian saree stores and not having much luck getting through. A couple didn't offer tailoring services; at one shop the phone just rang, and rang, and rang. One home-located business had had their phone disconnected, and the forwarding phone number wasn't working either.

Finally, I got lucky when I called Chaubara. The gentleman was very helpful and we set up an appointment Saturday. His wife is in India right now, on a shopping trip, I think, but he was able to get his mother to be there. She showed me how to put on a sari. This really helped a lot in getting the concept of how it all works. I do have a video but it's rather choppy. And then, later in the day we went over to the tailor who does ladies' garments. We told him what was needed, stressed that we needed one of the cholis and petticoats ready in a week so that I could have some time to practice putting these on for the wedding on July 2nd.

Raj at Chaubara advised that it would probably be a good idea to get some jewelry as it's usual for women to dress up to the finest for special events. There were some really lovely jewelry, and I finally settled on a black jet necklace and earrings. I liked some of the more fancy jewely, but it wouldn't be polite to “outshine” the bride even though in Indian weddings you'll see jewely everywhere. Black jewelry goes with anything, and for me, the colorfulness of the sari will be enough.

Yesterday, we went to India Saree Palace to see if we could find a nice outfit for Bruce. Unfortunately, they didn't have any in his size, but the gentleman said he would check with the other stores to see if they had one for him. And I got some bangles.

Yes, I have pictures of the necklace and earrings. However, the cable that I use to download picture seems to have gone missing. It's gotta be somewhere in my room and I'll have to do some good cleaning to see if it shows up.

Sometime later this week I'm going to see if I can find a decent sandal. I was hoping to find a pair of Indian shoes at the shops we visited in Langley Park, but no such luck. And with time being of essence, I don't think I'm going to be ordering one online, but will likely do so sometime in the near future.

Here's a new maxim: temper + key in ignition = locked car with driver standing outside and feeling rather chagrined.

Yep, this happened to me couple days ago which resulted me in being a hour late for my hair appointment - Bruce had to leave the hair salon so he could unlock car. And I know I owe him big time. This all happened because I forgot to add more fare onto my SmarCard, and they don't allow negative balances anymore for exiting the metro parking lots.

So next time, I will be sure to calm down, take careful stock of what I need to gather up before exiting the car. I always do that, making sure to put the keys in my purse and putting the purse on my body before exiting. But this is done when I'm relaxed anyway. It's times when temper gets the best of you that plans usually go awry.

And now it's back to normal June temperature, with humidity at a reasonable level. It was even quite cool this morning at 61 F when I left home. Should be quite pleasant for the coming week.

I'm making fairly good progress on the shawl. Every so often, I have to rip back because I missed a yarnover, or knit the wrong row. It's more complicated since I'm knitting this in garter and it does make it hard at times to see the pattern. However, the basic design is really easy to memorize and I just have to reorient myself with the chart from time to time. Already I've been asked twice on the metro as to what I was making. Hopefully by the end of the week I'll be halfway done.

For the past week or so, it's been incredibly hot and humid, with the temperature hovering in the high 80s - low 90s and humidity over 75%, which makes for a nice sauna and strong, ferocious thunderstorms. Seems like it was spring forever, and all of sudden we're in the “dog days of August mode”. I've been too keyed up to really do much knitting since I had to prepare for my performance review at work, and working on some really stubborn code.

A friend of my sister asked me where she could find patterns for a cap like the one with the snowflakes by Jytte. So I've been busy looking for these caps. I think I saw a couple of caps similar to these in my Dale patterns, so I have to look through these later tonite.

Wendy is running a button contest for “Summer of Lace”. The creator of the button which gets the most votes wins a prize, so I cast my vote for the one that I liked the best. This summer I will be working on the Irish Diamond Shawl from Folk Shawls, by Cheryl Oberle. I really like this pattern because of the way it drapes over you in the back and in the front, and it doesn't make you feel like you're clutching the shawl edges in an effort to keep warm. There's a problem with the pattern, though - there should be a yo between “k14” and “place marker” in Row 1.

Otherwise you'll be wondering why the stitches aren't adding up. I ended up having to start all over again since it'd been quite a while since I stopped work on this project (I'd only gotten halfway through chart one when I put it aside). Fortunately, I've got more than enough yarn for this project.

What does babies and knitting have in common? While prowling the blogs, I came across a NYT article about a protest at the ABC headquarters because Barbara Walters was complaining about having to sit next to a nursing mother on the plane.

Here's the news article - 'Lactivists' Taking Their Cause, and Their Babies, to the Streets. (Note that you might have to register at NYT site). What caught my eye was this section:

In interviews and Internet discussions, hundreds of women recount being asked to stop nursing in public spots, including the Children's Museum in Huntsville, Ala.; a knitting store in the East Village; a Radisson Hotel lobby in Virginia; a public bus in Los Angeles; and a city commission meeting in Miami Beach.

I'm really curious . . . which knitting store was this?

I think it's sad that we're told that breastfeeding is the best thing to do for babies, but then nursing mothers are too often told to go to the bathroom or driven out of the store or whatever. Look, babies have their own schedule and needs that have to be met in a timely manner, so the mother has to do what needs to be done to meet these needs immediately. For thousands of years it was a given that nursing mothers would feed their babies any where.

So what's with the squeamishness? Perhaps it's the eroticization of breasts. Breasts are designed to feed babies - that's the first priority. Any other benefits are secondary. Babies are to be nurtured in a healthy manner . . . shouldn't we all be understanding of this?

Bruce and I had a wonderful weekend . . . we enjoyed our time together and we went to see the movie Star Trek: Revenge of the Sith. Not bad and actually it was better than some of the previous ST movies. It's obvious that George Lucas hasn't been around pregnant women that much.

I mean . . . Padme is supposed to be expecting twins, and most of the scenes have her either at home or at the senate (or whatever it is that they call the place with all those seats). And then, in the crucial scene, we see her hopping into her spacecraft and sort of running around on a planet that resembles Dante's Inferno - what's up with that? No way can a pregnant woman move that nimbly. And boy, were the babies a bit big in the birth scene . . . I think this movie would have benefited from a woman's touch.

Alison is going to be hosting Sockapal-2-za which starts June 15, and yes, I've signed up. I've been going through the list of participants in the previous event and been drooling over all those gorgeous socks. This would also give me a chance to break out of my comfort zone in that I will need to consider my sock pal's likes and dislikes in mind. Should be a lot of fun..

And now, let me take my time to address Miss Young Thing, who was walking with her two friends in front of me yesterday morning as I was walking to my office:

I see that you are young, and that you're probably in high school. It's a fact that teenage girls tend to be very interested in being fashionable, and it seems that you're no expectation, as it seems also to be with your female friend. I noticed that you kept tugging your skirt edge down every so often as you were walking down the sidewalk. I was mystified . . . until I realized that I could see the very bare bottom of your buttocks. So it looks like miniskirts are back in style . . . and this time these really do come in mini size.

Yes, I know you want to be just like the other young ladies - but there has to be a fine line. Surely you realize that if you're spending half of your time tugging your mini-mini skirt down, and being very careful not to drop stuff or you'd be forced to pick it up (and give red-blooded men of all ages a sight to behold), something's wrong and you should probably reassess your wardrobe choices. There are really nice outfits that can be just as fashionable without crossing the line into being tacky. Just a friendly advice from someone who used to be a teenager.