August round-up

August began and ended with a focus on school. At the beginning of the month, I wrapped up my three summer classes: comments on first drafts, presentations, and posters. What was gratifying was that some students said that it was only during the final presentations that they realized what I was trying to convey. At the end of the month, I prepared for Nikita’s entry into the first grade, gathering the rest of his school supplies and gifts to fill his school cone.

Particularly stressful was the issue of his schoolbag. Since Nikita goes to a German bilingual school, we thought we would get a German schoolbag. This turned out to be a much bigger deal than we expected. At the beginning of the month, we spent nearly a week looking for a website that would ship to the U.S. We finally found one and ordered a bag. Shipping, however, took forever, and there was no trace of it after 8/13 (a person at VISA asked, “Is it made of gold?”). Through the grace of God, the bag arrived the day before school started.

Nikita actually was never concerned about his schoolbag. Instead, Nikita continued to improve his swimming by learning how to hold his breath, which allows him to swim longer and play around with the dead man’s float. He also made decent progress in chess. In one tournament, he won a trophy for coming in 2nd place in his age group (but there were only 3 kids); in another tournament, he had one win and one draw (came in 4th out of 6 kids). But, he also learned how to resign from games, which is not promising.

Back at home, we finally cleaned the house of baby clothes and toys, and dealt with our mouse problem by calling in a pest controller. He basically sealed up the house and put in more bait traps. He also said that rodents are a much bigger problem this year, perhaps because of the warm summer. At least we don’t have rats.

As for me, I read not just one, but two potentially life-changing books (If You Want to Write and A Whole New Mind) and found two excellent recipes that my family loves (“original” White Castle burgers and white chocolate chip-macadamia nut cookies). I also added beads to my future sister-in-law’s garter belt (the wedding is this weekend!), but in general, the knitting goddesses have not been kind to me. I started a new lace panel for my Lotus Blossom Tank (because the bottom used a different yarn), but ended up making a Moebius strip instead. Then I realized that the rest of the (unfinished) tank top is way too wide for me. But the summer is ending, which means it’s time to restart my other elusive project: Nikita’s Fair Isle Transformer hat. I’m beginning to think red yarn and I don’t mix.