Happy 2017!

Happy New Year! Happy 2017! My parents and I went to bed at reasonable times and woke up to the new year. I don't relish the staying up to welcome in the new year idea. I'd much rather be in bed well before midnight rolls around. We do have a sort of simple good luck tradition that we have done several years in a row now. We have a dinner of some good luck foods. I know there are many good luck foods you are supposed to eat on new year's day, but we have the ones we like. I make pig shaped cookies, because I won't eat pork, but eating pig or pork is good luck because pigs are rotund which represents prosperity and they always "root forward" symbolizing progress. Then we also have long noodles representing a long life, and dark leafy greens representing money. I also try to have at least one citrus (usually clementines) because they are round and gold in color they represent coins or again money/wealth/prosperity. I read somewhere the tradition is to eat 13 during the first of the year and I can't imagine eating that many citrus fruits in one day. Can you imagine?

Pig shaped cookies, this year they got sprinkles.

I'm not making any resolutions. I find I don't keep them. I want to be healthier so I plan to eat less junk, exercise more and in general do things that are considered healthy. It never lasts, I can be going along for a month or more and one day I simply stop trying. I don't say "screw it, I don't feel any healthier than before I started this so I'm not going to do it any more." I don't, but for some reason I stop making the conscious decision to not have that cookie, or to go on a walk. I have the cookie and I spend the day sitting, doing various stationary projects.

Romaine salad with spinach fettuccine. 

So instead of making a New Year's Resolution that I know I won't keep, I'm starting a new project that I will be able to tack on at the end of My Morning Ritual. I can write in my journal and then immediately pick up my crochet hook. I'm going to attempt a temperature blanket. I'm sure some of you have heard about this, or the "sky scarf." The sky scarf is one row of crochet or knit a day, but you have to use the shade of blue or gray that corresponds to what color the sky is at a certain time every day. Same for the temperature blanket except colors get assigned to a range of temperatures and then you use the high temperature for that day to pick your color.

A lot more journals full since I began my 3 pages a day ritual.

I made my own temperature chart and until I can get to the Hobby Lobby in Rhinelander I will record the temperatures each day and then play catch-up once I have my yarn. I will have 10 colors (maybe 11 if I decide to add one more above 80 degrees) because Wisconsin has such a wide temperature range every year. I could have an entire two or three weeks of one color if I did the suggested "below 22*." So I split it up a bit more. I picked out this pattern for a blanket, because it will hopefully not be too enormous if I use a small enough crochet hook and because I think it will be pretty as random strips of color. I made it once before following the suggested color pattern, but I will be following the color of the day.

My temperature color chart, I will add the yarn colors
after I make a trip to Hobby Lobby.

My mom has already offered to record the temperatures at home while I am hiking so that I won't miss two months of temperatures. I have some problems to figure out about my hike before I go, I have to go talk to the post master about the restrictions and rules regarding pressurized fuel canisters. I don't want to carry multiple fuel canisters, but I will if I have to. I'm still working on food ideas and I saw a blog about someone hiking the Ice Age Trail this winter and he has charts regarding his gear weight, distances he thinks he can hike a day and where that would put him for his resupply boxes. I may just take his chart for resupply and adjust it to me, if he's already got it all figured out why should I start from scratch? Work smarter not harder, right?