Friday, January 22, 2016

Not favorite parts

I'm slowly applying the binding to the new quilt. It takes me a long time because this kind of hand sewing - long, long straight whipstitched stuff where you have to take care to make it all invisible - is my least favorite type of handsewing (See also: hand hemming).

In general, I don't love putting bindings on quilts. First you have to make the binding and make sure you've measured right. Then you have to wrestle a whole quilt under the presser foot to do the machine-sewn part. Then there's the seeming miles of hand-stitching.

I also don't love cutting quilt pieces, which is why I've mostly switched over to things I can use the rotary cutter with - that's faster, and more importantly, it doesn't put the same stress on your hands that scissors do.

In knitting, there are similar tasks. I'm not crazy about gauge swatches (in fact, I will often just start a sweater back and then use the first couple inches as a sort-of swatch. I know you are "supposed" to wash and block the swatch to be sure, but I've never had a project where blocking turned something the "right size" into something unwearably large or small). I don't like weaving in ends, but it has to be done.

Seaming doesn't bother me as much as it bothers some knitters; I generally hand-seam my sweaters and things and usually it's not *hard* or boring to do.

One task I dislike and tend to avoid patterns that require lots of it is where you have to pick up tons of stitches and space them evenly - like for edgings on a cardigan. I especially find it frustrating when there is a particular exact NUMBER that must be picked up - it often seems that I'm "forcing" in those few last stitches, or I "run out" of stitches before the end. (When you don't have to be so precise, usually the simple rule of "3 stitches to 4 rows" works well - too many stitches and the band is too loose and floppy, too few and it scrunches up the front).

With crochet, meh, I don't know. I mostly crochet amigurumi these days and the main frustration of that is when you have to make a whole bunch of the "same piece" - like legs. Or if it happens the gauge you're working at is really tight and hurts your hands.

***

I got the "splint" to keep me from grinding my teeth yesterday. I guess I have to give it a few days. I was really hoping it would be kind of magical, that they would put it in, and it would be instantly comfortable (and as I tweeted, "Like the dental version of a security blanket"). It isn't. It's not painful but it's kind of weird and it pushes a little hard on one of my lower premolars and when I took it off, that tooth ached a bit. Also, my wonky bite - I can't really close my jaw down while I have the thing in (though that might be part of the point).

It's a clear, hard-plastic thing* that fits over my lower teeth. It is very tight and hard to get in - I have to slide it in over my right teeth and then kind of "snap" it down over the left side. That "snap" worries me and I hope it's not going to stress the teeth over time. (The "fitter" told me that was how it was supposed to work, so I suppose it's okay).

I wore it last night. I wound up getting up v. early (like 3 am) to use the bathroom and I took it out then, to have a little bit of sleep without it. I did sleep okay with it in: I was afraid I wouldn't, that it would drive me nuts and I'd wind up getting up at 11:30 pm and taking it out in frustration. But I'm not sure it helps as much as I hoped it would.

I may try NOT sleeping with it tonight. I think I'm going to have to work up to using this all the time. (I did put it in fairly early last evening, just to be sure I could)

(*I suppose it would have made it more expensive but I wish there had been the option of picking a color, or maybe picking embedded glitter. Apparently now dental retainers (for after braces) can be made that way; back when I had mine all they did was that ugly vaguely gum-colored pink. Yet another way that Gen X was kind of not-catered-to and then when the next generation came along, it seemed like everyone was all "Oh, wait, let's make things more fun and less miserable for these kids!" See also: new toys that came out after I was really too old to play with them)

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