Colleen Kueter 1968-2008

I didn’t know Colleen personally but after reading about her and her life I am sitting here with a lump in my throat and a deep sense of sadness.

I learned about her from a notice of her passing on the homepage of a website I belong to called Ravelry. It's for knitting, crocheting and fiber enthusiasts. I didn't know her, but I feel like I could have known her…turns out we have so much in common.

I found out she was only 40 years old and died of an aggressive form of liver cancer on October 17, only two months after having been diagnosed. She had two children 5 and 2 yrs old who both had birthdays just weeks before she died.

I read her blog Spiffy Knits and found that she loved to knit and dye fiber and spin her own yarn. After reading portions of her blog I could feel her excitement about her yarn dyeing and spinning and how much she enjoyed being a WAHM (work at home mom). She was also an "older" mommy like me - she had her children when she was 35 and 38 years old and they are almost the same ages as my two children.

She left the corporate world to do what she loved - work with fiber by spinning, dyeing and knitting it under the name "Spiffy Knits". Just last year, almost a year to the day when she would die from liver cancer, she formed a little internet business called "Tiny Lady Cooperative" with two other women so that she could sell her hand-dyed yarn and fiber.

Through the magic of Google I was able to see her Obituary, her LinkedIn page, her Amazon wish list and her family's Flickr page. I saw photos from when her two children were born (2003, 2006), of her working on renovating her house and re-modeling her kitchen. I could tell from her smile and light in her eyes that she was an energetic, happy person. Her wish list on Amazon gave a glimpse into where her interests were and what was important to her at different times in her life - it varied from books on "How to Be Your Own Literary Agent" - marked in 2004 to "Nourishing Foods for Cancer Survivors" marked days after she was diagnosed in August 2008. In between those dates were books about motherhood and knitting; knitting patterns, books about color and about dyeing with natural dyes grown yourself. She seemed to have a zest for life, that much seems painfully clear.

My heart breaks to think of her family without their mommy and their wife. Her little boy, the two year old, will likely not remember her at all. My son will also be two in January and having that point of reference is almost too much. It all makes me want to cry. I cried on the way from my office to the train thinking about it all.

Her story moved me enough that I am going to make a donation to the college fund that has been set up for her two children. I feel like that is the least I could do for someone that I didn’t know but sounded so much like me and someone I wish I had met. There is a fundraiser going on at Celebrating Colleen organized by the internet cooperative she formed with two friends last year.

I guess I'm hoping that word will get out and maybe the fundraising activities will be successful and at least her children will have some sort of college fund of substance for them since they won't have their mother.

UPDATE November 6 : I just found out that I won one of the raffles I entered in Colleen's fundraiser! I'm so excited - check out the gorgeous basket of sock yarn . Even more exciting is the fundraiser brought in $12K for Colleen's children's college fund - I'm so happy that I was able to participate and it makes me feel so good to know that so many people cared about her and her children to try and help.

The Gift of Nothing

I know in my last post I reminded everyone that the holidays are coming, so start repurposing those colorful magazine pages and make bows for all those gifts that you will be giving in a few months.

However, I really am anti-consumerism. I don't like the excess, over-the-top gift giving that is common in the United States. The idea of having to save for Christmas gifts all year long or worse yet, go into debt in order to buy gifts so that one can abide by an implied standard by giving a certain amount of gifts really turns my stomach. And it makes me sad too.

I try to stick to a tight budget and get a lot of pleasure from making gifts or finding gifts during the year and putting them aside for Christmas gifts (this works great as long as you don't 1) forget what you bought 2) forget where you put what you bought).

Last year we gave my daughter a terrific book that I found on the Mutts website (I love Mutts! It's a wonderfully thoughtful and pertinent comic strip drawn by Patrick McDonnell. I love his messages and the artwork really speaks to me as well. The characters are sweet and wonderful too!)

When I came across this book review for "The Gift of Nothing" I thought I would share it here on my blog. Maybe it will find its way on your gift list this Christmas season - you can find it here.

Magazine Bows

This lovely gift bow was made from a page of a magazine - can you believe it? Sometimes I see really colorful, pretty ads or pictures in magazines and think "what could I make out of this? It seems too nice to throw away". Well, now I have a project, just need to find the time to give this a try.

While I haven't tried it yet maybe you can - check out this link for an easy tutorial. I also borrowed the picture from that website too. I think this would be fun to try with kids too - they could find the pictures, or put the strips on the brads? Minimal sharp objects or sticky materials to worry about.

Get going - the holidays are coming!

Tree Smart pencils

From my trusty "Living Green 365 Ways to Make a Difference" calendar (email edition, of course). If you have to use a pencil why not try one of these out?

"Tree Smart makes pencils directly out of old newspapers, without any mulching or chemicals. They wrap the paper around the graphite and bind it with an adhesive that dries hard as wood, so the pencil is easy to sharpen. Funky-looking, too.

Do your part: One sheet of recycled newsprint makes four pencils. More information is available at www.treesmart.com."

Quotable

“When we destroy nature, we diminish ourselves and impoverish our children.”


—Robert Kennedy Jr.

Oh My Goodness

Uh oh, what is this all about? Hmmmmmm, it looks like an awful lot of yarn.... Lorna's Laces hand-dyed yarn to be exact. You can read all about the soft, woolly delights in my knitting blog.

In addition to that adventure this morning I also bumped into the last jerk - er, I mean man, that I dated before meeting my now-Hubby. I was with my knitting friends having a late breakfast before heading over to Lorna's. I was wearing typical Saturday morning attire - jeans, t-shirt and a hooded sweater. No make-up and the onset of a pimple rearing its head on my chin. So, imagine my sheer delight - more like horror - when I looked up from my cheddar broccoli quiche and noticed him sitting at the table right in front of me. With a wedding ring on. With his skinny wife (who, coincidence or not has short, dark curly hair just like me.... hmmmm....) After I got over the shock of course all I could think about was the pimple, the no-makeup and the extra 20 lbs I was carrying since I saw him last. Especially since one of the last things he said to me was "your body just doesn't match your mind" which was apparently a reference to my sharp-as-nails intellect cough, cough and my, let's say, rubenesque figure. All class, this man was.

Anyway, we clearly both noticed each other but thankfully neither acknowledged it. I was glad to see that he finally had a decent haircut - must be the new wife's influence - as well as a double chin. Guess his body is starting to catch up to his inflated ego and intellect as well.

Take Your Blog to Work Day

Have you heard of "Take Your Child to Work Day"? Well, my kids are too young for that yet so I decided to take all of you with me on my commute to and from work. I thought it might be fun to share some of what I experience every day.

I've heard us commuters referred to as "cattle" and while I find that reference kind of offensive I guess when you see the mass of slow moving people all going east (in the morning) and west (in the evening) we do kind of look like cattle. Many of us just put our heads down and walk, knowing that our feet will get us to work without our brains really having to think about it.

Some days you will get dripped on when the window washers are working up on their scaffolds, so when you see soapy drips on the sidewalk you know to steer clear and do NOT look up! This particular morning a man was cleaning this metal pillar with soapy water and a rag. Yup, good old-fashioned soap and elbow grease! These buildings are beautiful and I can't imagine the cost to maintain them, including all the little things like washing all the windows regularly and keeping all the shiny metal looking good. I haven't washed the windows of my house and I've lived in it for four years.

This is a rare sight - a vacant lot. It seems to be in a prime location so I'm surprised someone hasn't built something on it. I used to be able to cut across this lot and shave a few seconds off my walk but then several years ago they put up the fencing. Shortly after that I saw that it was being used to store movie equipment when they were filming the Batman movies - "Batman Returns" and most recently "Dark Knight". I saw cars with the Gotham City PD emblem on them parked there as well as row after row of trailers for the extras.


Almost every morning I walk down Wells St. and get a chance to see this adult video/bookstore sandwiched between two fast food restaurants. It always makes me laugh a little - grab your take-out lunch at AsiaGo or Taco Fresco and then stop in the adult video store before heading back to work? In fact, in addition to this store I have counted three adult video/bookstores within a two block radius of my office. I'm not sure what that says...

Ahhhh, good old Standard Parking. If you ever drive into Chicago you'll probably park at one of these and it is NOT cheap. So take public transportation if you can! I wonder how this company was able to get a corner on the parking garage business...

I had to get a picture of the Sears Tower - can you see it peeking out? It has the two-pronged white antenna sticking up.

Here is another shot looking south towards the Sears Tower

I have been watching this construction project for quite a while, from when it was at ground level. Oddly about six months ago all work seemed to stop. Now with the financial crisis I wonder if this was a little foreshadowing of what was to come. These are "hotel condos" which I don't know a whole lot about but I understand that when you are not living in your unit you can have it used as part of the hotel option which can earn you some cash flow. But the building has to be finished first...

This is The Merchandise Mart - it is a huge building and actually has its own zip code as well as a lot of interesting history. You can't help but feel its presence when you walk by.

Marina Towers - you may recognize them from the opening credits of the "Bob Newhart Show" (I'm dating myself) or the crash scene from "The Hunter" when a car drives off the building and into the Chicago River below. The famous "House of Blues" is also located in Marina City.

You can also see the new Trump Tower, which is under construction, in the background. The old Sun Times building was razed to build the Trump Tower; while I am normally against tearing down perfectly functional structures in this case it was a definite improvement. The prior building was hideous and hugely non descript. In fact the building they moved into now is still pretty much just a brown shoe box... nothing like the beautiful Tribune Tower but I digress...

Just an interesting shot looking down Wacker Drive...

Ahhh, the elevated train! aka "the el". This is why the heart of Chicago's downtown is called "the loop" because of the pattern that the el tracks form.

It is absolutely deafening walking under the tracks when a train is going by, but you really feel you are in a bustling city when it does.



One of the many high rise office buildings I have seen go up. It's really fascinating to see them go up from literally a hole in the ground to this point and beyond. "Awwww, I remember when you were just a muddy hole in the ground - look how big you are now!!"

The Lyric Opera is right near Union Station which makes me think it would be ultra convenient to take the train into the city, catch a performance and then hop a train back home. Unfortunately, I don't care for opera... I wish I did, but I don't.

I feel very cultured every time I just walk by their entryway - just look at how pretty and elegant it is. This is one of the various street performers I see and hear on a daily basis. He is a regular and I really enjoy hearing him play his makeshift drums. He is always so upbeat (no pun intended) and seems to really enjoy himself. He changes what he plays and sings based on if the Bears are winning, or if it's Christmas time. Having played an instrument when I was younger I know how hard it is and always appreciate it when I hear a street musician playing and I make sure to let them know by dropping a few dollars in their bucket.

The water taxi - I love this idea and although I don't use it anymore (I walk instead) one summer season I used it every day and it was a wonderful way to start and end my day. The ride is only about seven minutes up the river but something about being on the water is so soothing.
This man is a bit of a puzzle to me. I've seen him for at least five years - interestingly he started out sitting in a wheelchair (always has had the dark glasses on but recently I saw him do something that makes me thing he isn't blind). About two years ago he switched to a regular chair, then crates and now in the last few weeks he has started to stand with his hands out. He doesn't say anything but is very friendly if you talk to him. He also used to have a different religious themed quote on a large piece of poster board that he had propped next to him. He has phased that out but will occasionally put a poster out - one of the recent ones was in July when he announced his 91st birthday.

He is one of three people that are always posted right outside the train station - I wonder if some of the changes he has made has been to "compete" with the other people asking for money? One of them is an elderly woman who sells "Streetwise" a publication for homeless people to sell to try and earn money, and another very frail looking man who holds a piece of cardboard saying he is a Veteran. Interesting how they all seem to appeal to different groups of people...

And here I am, at the end of my day and hopping the train to go home.

Hope you enjoyed your little virtual tour of Chicago!