Learning to skate

Warning, this is an almost entirely sewing free post!

Yesterday afternoon I took Kate down to our local ice rink. This is her third time ice skating, and by far the most successful. She's already talking about going again next weekend. Kate's actually named after Katarina Witt, so I guess it was just a matter of time before she got bitten by the skating bug as well.


Kate looking a bit concered before we started:


And on the ice, now smiling:


My grandfather taught me to skate when I was a little kid, and after our lesson yesterday I have new respect for all the work that entails. I spent two hours holding Kate up and skating backwards... thankfully something I'm ok doing, since I used to play defense on our college hockey team. As we were going around and around and around I kept pointing out the lines and circles under the ice to Kate and explaining how they were used in hockey. She got really into it- every time we went over a blue line she would yell "puck out, get out!" So cute. And she was fascinated by the penalty boxes and wanted to sit in them "for a tiredness penalty" a few times. We even had an adorable feminism lesson- when we first went out she was looking at the ads on the side of the rink, and there were some hockey school ones with photos of guys playing hockey. She looked up and asked "can women play hockey?" I told her absolutely, lots of women play hockey. When we got off the ice for a pretzel refueling, she told my mom "guess what? girls play hockey too!" Which of course cracked my mom up. She gave me a "I know where that came from" look and told kate that girls could do whatever they want. Awwww. I love my mom. Especially since she froze in the bleachers for 2 hours while we skated!

I wish I'd gotten a picture of Kate's hockey skates. They're the cutest little teensy things.

Just to make it somewhat sewing related- I'm wearing on of my favorite shirts, an ancient Helly Hansen thermal shirt. I bought it when I was right out of college to replace one that I'd literally worn to shreds in school. I cut off the cuffs because I have short arms and prefer to shove the sleeves up to my elbows, then I slashed the front neck so it wasn't so tight. I wear this shirt constantly- it has to be washed with borax pretty often to keep it from smelling like an old gym locker. I wish I had a pattern and the right material to knock it off. The fit is perfect for me, as it comes all the way down over my hips but doesn't get too tight there and isn't too lose at the top. The fabric is really the key to why I always wear it though. It's some polypro type fabric that's warm when you need it to be and super breathable and soft.