Thursday, March 19, 2009

Re-Newed

Maybe you're blessed with naturally photogenic looks. The camera doesn't have to see a classically beautiful face to love that face. Some people just always have flattering pictures of them -- something about the arrangement of cheekbones and eyes, chin and forehead.

I'm not one of those people. I routinely allow my children to take pictures of me, only to gasp in horror at the Sicilian crone looking out from raccoon-dark eyes, wild, mind-of-its-own hair, and horrifying expression. In them, I'm only inches away from grabbing a broom and chasing them around. Fortunately, I'm in charge of deleting pictures from the disk and figuring out what to print, too, so I only leave about every fifteenth of those in there. No sense lying to the great-grandchildren that I didn't start the slide into cronehood at about 25. Maybe they can use it as a warning, and start investing into good under eye cream early on.

There is one picture of me, though, that I adore. Fortunately I get to carry it around all the time, but it's not quite the same. I'd like, ideally, a 14x16" print of it on my wall, in one of those oval old-timey frames. It's that good. I look Sicilian, but more Sophia Loren than a little old village lady. It came in the mail today. Unfortunately, it has some holograms right over my hair, and it's only about an inch square.


(wait for it)







Something that's not often seen -- a beloved driver's license picture. This one's good until 2014, so maybe I can keep it until I truly am a little old lady and it will more obviously be the vanity it is now.

Something else got done today.


This one was started way back in 2007 for Tor. I must have messed up the cable and put it away in a fit of pique. I found it yesterday in a shopping bag, didn't know why on earth I couldn't have fixed it earlier, and figured I'd finish it off. It will, of course, only fit Caterina right now.

Unfortunately, I created some more mistakes in the finishing, none of which I'm going to either point out here or dwell on, firstly because I'm not doing that to my knitting any more: good knitters can see the mistakes and think I'm an idiot, non-knitters won't see them, and secondly, I'm not willing to reknit this baby a single stitch more. I'm also out of yarn and would have to rip, cannibalize, and then reknit. Not going to happen.

Instead, I'm going to encourage behavior like this as long as she's wearing it:



See? No mistakes! Amazing how fast a sweater gets done when 7/8 of it is already finished. I wonder if I can arrange to have that happen to all my knitting from now on?

6 comments:

allisonmariecat said...

I love the no-mistakes photo shoot--a brilliant technique. I think it's an adorable sweater on an adorable model.

My mom got so mad when she had to go get her photo retaken to renew her license a few years ago. She'd had the same photo for 15 years! I delete most of the photos of myself, too. I leave the ones in which Lilah is cute/my butt doesn't look overly big, just so there are actual "family pictures" for Lilah to look at later (that include the family).

cpurl17 said...

I have to renew my passport this year and will be sad to give up the photo I have now. Your DL photo is very glam!

And the sweater (and wearer) are very cute!

amanda j said...

I have found that striking ridiculous poses works for me. Two victory signs with the hands, pointing at my head and a stupid grin. I hate having my photo taken!!

Very cute, both of you.

Esperanza said...

I once got dressed up, put on make up and everything, to renew my license. Then failed. Then went back on a day I barely had time to brush my teeth, and passed...Apparently their cameras can't capture curly black locks and my hair looks like steel wool. I considered losing it and paying for a replacement but haven't been able to go that deep with my vanity. Well, not yet at least.

Lara said...

So cute! Love the sweater and the model.

I used to love every picture of me. Now I hate almost all of them. I'm trying to get over that. I think my face is too round, but the fact is that it has always been round, even when I was super-thin.


Great drivers license pic, though! Yay!

Ruby Louise said...

BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING BOING

Oh, if only it were possible to bottle that energy or even just borrow it some days.

For some reason, with the orange sweater, I'm reminded of the Tigger Song. (Beautiful sweater, btw.)