S & B Party

September 28^th, 2012

Feeling the major lack of a normal social life that comes along with being a PCV, us girls decided we needed a girl’s night in.  We decided to have a Stitch and B*#@h Party.  About 15 of us crammed ourselves into one of the volunteer’s houses and we did just that, plus a whole lot of eating (pot luck never tasted so good).  A whole lot of b*#@^ing was done of course (got to vent to survive here) and we even managed to get a bit of stitching in as well.  I finally learned and hopefully will now forever remember how to start a knitting project and finish one, I made a tiny little cell phone case.  It felt like a major accomplishment. 

Yarn here is crap and expensive for the quality and of course I didn’t bring knitting supplies with me to Swaziland but have no fear we are Peace Corps Creative!  Another PCV came prepared with needles for everyone.  How did she get them you ask?  Well she simply bought them at the grocery store.  Turns out meat skewers make fantastic knitting needles!  I have since bought myself a nice package of these knitting needles and have become a cell phone case-knitting machine.  I’ve seriously made cases for almost every electronic item I own here, and in the process received two slivers – the prices we pay.  I look forward to the next S&B party to learn to make something more advanced – a hat maybe, or a some mitts to keep me extra toasty here in Africa.  Several of the other PCVs are excellent knitters, so I am eager to learn from them.  This was my first social event that included PCVs from the new Group 10.  It was nice to have some new faces!  They have been at their sites now for a month.  Listening to where they are at in their service makes me realize just how far I have come.  Their problems, that I also thought were earth shattering a year ago, seem so minor to me now that I’ve had a year to figure it out.  I have new problems of course, but I am glad I’ve conquered the problems that clouded my life a year ago.