Vision Board for 2023

 Here’s a sneak peek at what I’m working on for 2023! 

Taking Stock of my Hoard

​Last night after finishing my Granny afghan I was too wired to sleep, but didn’t want to wake D or Jo, so I decided to go down to the family room and inventory the two huge totes of yarn I have in the corner!  OMG!  In case you were unaware, a characteristic of ADHD is that you lack item permanence.  Quite literally, out of sight, out of mind!  I have so many cool cakes of yarn I had forgotten all about!  Including the Caron Anniversary Cakes which are massive!  How does someone forget 1000gm cakes of yarn, let alone 5 of them?! Or superwash wool hanks in a color called Roy G Biv?! 

Of course I had this epiphany after I got a door buster ad for Joanns where I could get the Red Heart Super Saver Ombré yarn I’ve been wanting for a low price of about $6.19 a skein including tax. So of course I ordered it in a rainbow of 7 colors and in order to potentially use it for the Study of Ombré Afghan pattern I had to get 2 skeins of each.  So another 14 skeins are going to be joining the stash later today.  

I’m not sure what my next project should be.  Perhaps the Yarnspirations Farm Fresh Market Tote made from a cake of Caron Cotton Lava Cakes?  Just kidding, I’m already on row 1!

Granny Squares Galore!

​I finished my granny square afghan tonight/this morning.  It’s massive!  Like a bedspread for a king sized bed-massive!  I downsized from my original plan of making it 16x18 squares down to 14x16.  The squares were blocked to 5” square. But then I did the Join-as-you-go method of connecting them with contrasting black yarn and that added additional inches. Then I learned of the block stitch border stitch pattern and tossed a few rounds of that on after it was all stitched together. So, yeah, massive.  It weighs about 9-10 pounds according to my bathroom scale. 

All in all, I used 3 pounds of black Caron yarn for the joining and border, plus 21 colors of various brands of yarn (Red Heart, Caron, I Love This Yarn and Big Twist) to make up the squares and the color pop in the border.  I used an H 5mm hook from Hobby Lobby that I love. I started crocheting the squares on July 2nd.  I started joining them together on July 19th.  I made 16 squares of most colors, fewer with the smaller skeins and leftover yarn from the temperature blankets.  I have 70 squares leftover to use in my next scrap project.  I also generated about 2 cups of yarn tails I trimmed from all the squares I used.  I spent most of today weaving and trimming those.  Next time I think I will weave the center (starting) end before I join them, then pay attention to putting the ending tail towards the back of the work.  I don’t mind the weaving at the end of the project but it was cumbersome with such a massive project and some tails on the front and some on the back of the work.  

Now I need to take a short break to catch up on other things before I dive into my next project.  

July Already

​I’ve fallen down a rabbit hole of Crochet projects recently.   I finished 2 temperature blankets for my daughters, a shawl, 3 ponchos, a market tote, and I’m in the midst of a crocheted tee, a Tunisian Crochet blanket, and a bobbled tote bag.  I bought a lot of new yarn but I have plans to keep crocheting like crazy and this craft uses an extreme amount of yarn compared to knitting.  I ordered a blocking board yesterday to block granny squares to a universal size so I can seam them together neatly into an afghan.  I’ve always wanted a colorful granny square afghan but my squares come out wonky looking so I give up easily.  I have a ton of acrylic colorful yarns to use up in my stash and I can’t wait to start that project after I finish at least 1 of the 3 I have started.  

Catch Up

 Well, I’ve been knitting like mad and finished a pair of socks out of Premier Cotton Collage yarn in Circus Multi.  They are just vanilla socks for me. I also finished knitting the 2nd skein of Malabrigio Rios yarn on my Worsted Boxy.  I’m afraid I will run out of yarn for that too.  The temperature Afghan for Courtney is on July 1st. This week I get out of work a bit earlier than I have for the past few weeks so I will probably concentrate on the afghan this week. I ordered sock blockers and a new ballwinder from Knitpicks tonight. My existing ball winders have stripped gears and suck. I need to wind the next skein for Worsted Boxy and for another pair of socks but I can’t stomach the hassle with the old ball winder.  

Final Destinations

​It’s been a couple weeks since I’ve felt like writing, but I’ve been knitting madly the whole time. My extra skein of yarn came in and I finished All the Love on February 19th.  I haven’t blocked it yet, and it really needs to be blocked before I can wear it.  

While waiting for the yarn to arrive I got back to Jo’s Big Comfy Sweater.  I finished knitting that tonight and started seaming.  It’s quite an undertaking due to the size,  and the number of ends to weave in is daunting. Caron had quite a bunch of knotted together parts in the 4 cakes it took to knit this sweater. 

I also managed to ply the bobbins of Blue-Faced Leicester oatmeal fiber I spun. I set the twist and then started knitting it into a garter stitch scarf.  

I used some tie-dye to color some wool pink to spin next.  I’m not sure if I will spin it on a spindle or wheel yet. 

I also signed up for a beginner serger class to learn how to use my serger I bought myself for Christmas in 2019 and have only tried to use it once and that was an utter failure.  I ordered the fabric I need for the class samples and the thread for the machine.  I’m not sure if I’m brave enough to try untangling the mess and rethread the machine.  I might if I get bored with yarn projects.

Up next is finishing the seaming/end weaving on Jo’s sweater, then getting back to my Temperature afghan.  It will be nice to get back to that project of crochet.  I might cast on a sock with the yarn I got in my Sock of the Month shipment. The crochet project is so huge I can only work on it in the family room and sometimes I want to work on something in bed  before I go to sleep. 

When I ordered the yarn for All the Love from eat.sleep.knit, I also ordered 2 colors of chunky wool from Premier Yarns that were on sale at a decent price. I want to make Joji’s EasyBulky One from that yarn. I got Honeydew green for me and Chic Blue for Jo.  Although after making the Big Cozy Sweater for her, I’m not sure I want to make her another oversized sweater, especially out of non-Superwash wool.  Washing and blocking a 3X sweater will be a chore.  I will probably make my Worsted Boxy sweater out of the Malabrigo Rios yarn first, then a Easy Bulky One for myself, by which point winter knitting will be over. 

 

Losing Yarn Chicken

​It was a crazy week!  I spent every spare moment knitting on All the Love.  And by spare I mean time I found when I should have been sleeping, while riding in a car, while waiting for service at a restaurant.  In fact, I was up until 5am this morning trying to knit as fast as I could to determine if I needed to order more Silk Blend to finish the sweater.  With about 25 rounds of sleeve left to go, I called it a night and ordered the yarn.  I briefly contemplated undoing the ribbing on the body, shortening the sweater an inch, then using the reclaimed yarn to finish the sleeve. But I don’t have that in me. It wouldn’t make it out of the frog pile if I set that expectation on the project.  So instead I ordered a skein and prayed it arrives before I get tired of this sweater project all together.  I knit to the end of the yarn when I got home from work today and I have 1/3 of a round with my last decrease, then 18 rounds of 2x2 ribbing.  I went with shorter sleeves to try to conserve yarn and could go back and make them longer with the new yarn, but I don’t think I feel like doing that either.  The lace pattern needs to be blocked.  I hope that part goes well. I’ve never blocked a hand knit sweater before - only shawls and socks.  

I also ordered 25 skeins of Bulky wool yarn that were on a great sale at Premier Yarns to make The Easy Bulky One for me & possibly for Jo.  I got 10 skeins of Honeydew green for me and 15 skeins of Blue Chic for Jo. My parents gave me money as a birthday gift so that is what I’m using to cover most of the expense. 

Now that I’m in a holding pattern on All the Love until my order from eat.sleep.knit comes in, I will go back and work on Jo’s Blueberry Pudding Big Comfy Sweater.  I can’t wait for that sweater to be done so I can get back to crocheting the Temperature Afghans. 

I finished spinning my 8 oz of BFL wool last week and Wednesday I plan to ply it.  I haven’t plied wool in about 10 years. I hope the yarn is at least good enough to knit a hat with it.  I spin pretty fine wool singles, so even 2 plies is probably sock weight yarn. I’ll probably knit a Ross Hat with it.  I haven’t knit any of those yet. After plying the Oatmeal colored BFL, I plan to use some dyes I got to dye some bare roving to spin into yarn as practice.  I don’t want to ruin the good wool I bought before the end of the year from Paradise Fibers.  I’m probably going to microwave process the dye.  The other option I’ve used in the past was putting it in the crockpot.  I don’t really care what color I use or how it comes out. I am just bored spinning natural colored wool.

I got a bunch of books on knitting, crocheting and spinning from the library that I need to go thru on my day off.  There just isn’t enough time for all my fiber crafts. 

 

Panic delays

​Having anxiety issues along with depression and adhd can make life hell. Today I’m procrastinating getting up because I’m having a panic attack for some unknown reason. I just don’t want to get out of bed. I put away my knitting and changed from listening to a movie to playing an old music playlist, hoping that would change my mood but it’s not helping.  In my previous jobs this would have resulted in a FMLA-protected day off. While I qualify for it, in practice it’s just not feasible for me to do that at this job. We are a small team and I can’t flake out.  So the alternative is to suck it up and get ready for work and head to McDonalds for my usual coke with extra ice and a spicy crispy chicken sandwich without pickles. 

I’ve gotten All The Love to 8”. I’m not expecting to get much if anything done on it today because I have to be to work early tomorrow and I work late tonight.  It doesn’t look like this project will be done by my birthday but I’m gonna keep chugging along on it until I finish it anyway.  Then I will get back to Jo’s sweater and the C2C Afghan. 

More than half way there!

​Well today I got into my 5th ball of yarn on my sweater.  I’m a little more than 7 inches below the armhole.  I decided against the laundromat and stayed home doing laundry and knitting most of the day.  When Dan put on Jack Ryan my progress slowed because I had to read the subtitles.  We finished season 1 and started season 2 tonight.  I was up until about 3am and got my first bobbin of BFL wool spun.  Now I just have to finish spinning bobbin 2 and I can ply. I watched a video today on how to spin hand painted tops and was a little inspired even though I’m still spinning natural brown top right now.  I have some beautiful colorful tops I can’t wait to tap into. 

I also managed to get my yarns into the new storage bins I bought for them last month, so we can recycle all the cardboard boxes they shipped to me in. I’ve been saying I’m gonna do that for weeks now. 

I didn’t cross off all the things on my to do list for my vacation but I did get to spend a solid 10 days with my husband and oldest daughter, so that was good. We ate at some good restaurants and did some fun activities, and I made excellent progress on my sweaters and c2c afghan and spinning hobbies.  So all in all, it was a success.  

40% Complete

​I’m so proud of my progress on All The Love.  Today I got into my 4th ball of yarn on my sweater.  I’m in the body of the sweater, about 4” below the armpits, working from the top down.  I probably could have done more again today but we went out for brunch then to Dave & Busters, got cookies from Crumbl, bubble tea, and my McDonalds Coke with extra ice.  Then we came home and started watching Jack Ryan on Amazon, which is subtitled a good portion of the time. Tomorrow I need to get some cleaning and organizing done so I probably shouldn’t plan on knitting but I know I will squeeze some in when I’m having the pre-Monday-Post-Vacation anxiety attack in the evening.  

I had planned on joining the zoom meeting with the School of SweetGeorgia today but since we were out until after 4pm I missed it. I did watch Felicia’s YouTube video about her purchase of a sock knitting machine.  I really want one and I’ve looked for some before. She posted a link to the company she ordered hers from and I really want one, but they are over $1500.  I have no idea when I would possibly have that kind of extra money. But it’s there as a daydream. 

Joined up!

 I got All The Love to the point of having the front & back joined and started working in the round. Only 15” of stockinette and lace columns to go before the bottom ribbing and sleeves and collar treatment.  I’m not sure I will get it done by my birthday on the 13th but that is my goal.  I’ve used about 30% of my yarn so I feel accomplished to have this much done but also a little disappointed that I didn’t get as much done today as I expected.  I had anxiety chest pains today and my meds for that make me sleepy.  So I took some naps and watched some tv that was too riveting to knit at full speed.  Reacher is a great TV show. We binged the whole season today. 

Great Scot!

 Wow!  This sweater is coming along smoothly and rapidly. All The Love is constructed differently from every other sweater I’ve knit, so it took some imagination and faith that I was following the pattern directions correctly as I worked. Today I managed to get both the upper back down to 6” from the shoulder seams and the right & left fronts joined and began knitting the front section.  About 4 1/2” to go before I get to join the body front & back and work in the round. Then when the body is done I have to pick up and knit the sleeves and neckband.  I can probably get this done by my birthday if I put down all my other projects for the next 9 days. That’s my goal anyway. I think the fiddly parts are behind me now and it should be smooth sailing. Of course now that I’ve said it, disasters are inevitable. 

Today the only real breaks I took from the sweater was to go to a new restaurant that does Korean BBQ and a quick run to Target where I got Shout Color Catchers to put in the wash with my wool sweater I plan to wash tomorrow.  It’s dark purple and I expect that to bleed like crazy the first time it’s washed.  And then I took a nap for a bit.  But for the most part I spent the entire day knitting.  Oh and I made some planner stickers for my Hobonichi Weeks planner.  While I knit I watched various videos and my standby movies.  

Tomorrow is supposed to be a terrible storm so schools are closed and I plan to stay in and do laundry and some yarn organizing between knitting.  If the roads are cleared we might go out for breakfast but I’m perfectly content staying in my pjs all day.  

All The Love has launched

​So yesterday I gave into my yarn craving and cast on All The Love using my birthday yarn, Manos del Uruguay Silk Blend.  The color of Cactus Flower wasn’t quite the lipstick pink I was expecting but it’s still very pink and that’s what I was looking for. I got about 6 rows in and somehow had the wrong number of stitches so the directions didn’t match and I got frustrated and put it down. I looked for pattern corrections, downloaded the latest copy of the directions, but it still was the same instructions. I went back and couldn’t figure out where I had gone wrong but worked out how to fudge it so I would be back on track going forward. After that hurdle, I made swift progress on the back of the sweater.  I’m at about 2” of a 6” stretch of lace patterned knitting. 

Jo’s sweater is up to the sleeve cast on, so I have the dreaded ridged upper section to work. It also means that sweater is close to done. That’s a project that can travel as it’s only a 4 row repeat of knit and purl, whereas All The Love has lace patterns on both sides of the front and back and I don’t dare work on it without sitting still with my pattern flash cards keeping my place. 

I am also still working on spinning my Blue-Faced Leicester wool.  It’s slow going now that I’m down to the point where I split the top in half so I could spin the rest of it onto my 2 bobbins evenly.  I thought I was almost done, but I don’t seem to be getting any closer as I work thru the fiber.  I signed up for Craftsy again for this year when I got an email offering the year for $2 again. I wanted to finish watching the videos on spinning that they had available but I didn’t get thru before my last subscription expired on Christmas. I also got a video and several books from the library to look thru. The yarn has too much twist I think, but I’m not sure how to fix that besides drafting faster or treadling slower, both of which are difficult to do, as they are muscle memory at this point. 

Since I’m awake at this ungodly hour on my vacation and apparently slept in my contacts, I might as well get up and start knitting.  We have an 11am reservation for Korean BBQ, but other than that my day is clear. I would like to get to at least 6” on my sweater today. 

Prepped for Sweaters

​I got bored knitting on Jo’s sweater yesterday so I decided to take a couple breaks to print out my sweater patterns for Joji Locatelli’s All The Love and Worsted Boxy on sticker paper, cut them down and stuck them in my Hobonichi Weeks.  It will serve as an easy place to have the pattern at my side as I work and a memory of the accomplishment in my planner.  

Yesterday was a pj day where I sat in bed and worked a couple rows on my afghan and as much as I could on Jo’s sweater. I’m dreading the sleeves, both because it will require more stitches in each row and because it will be in that annoying ridged pattern I can’t seem to keep track of in my head. Today we are spending the day at Turningstone Casino playing Bingo. I will be bringing my knitting to work on during the down time. I was thinking about casting on a sock to work today but I’m gonna keep plugging away at Jo’s sweater. I am about to run out of the first cake in a couple inches on one piece, so I’m gonna try to work until I run out of yarn I guess. I estimated it would take up to 4 cakes so I have plenty of yarn to use to finish it up.  

Leaps & Bounds!

​Well, I’m feeling quite accomplished after I figured out how to do C2C crochet on the afghan kit I got from WeCrochet.  I had to watch a YouTube video to get a handle on the color changes, but then I rocked & rolled! I’m on row 21 of 95 but I feel like this is going to be a fairly quick project because the color changes every few blocks keeps me engaged.  I spend a lot of time counting to make sure I’m getting the pattern right, like I do with lace knitting.  It was refreshing to learn something new after 20+ years of knowing how to crochet.  I still haven’t broken out my new Tunisian crochet hook set to try that. I think I will save that for when this crochet afghan is finished, considering I have a sweater for Jo, the Temperature afghan for Courtney, and still a good amount of Blue-Faced Leicester wool top left to spin before I can ply my first (in 10 years anyway) yarn. 

I tried to find local yarn shops near me to visit this week but it looks like they didn’t survive the pandemic or are strictly online now. I think for my birthday in a couple weeks I will ask for some silk blend yarn for Joji’s All The Love sweater.  I have some that I started the pattern with years ago in a different size and I’m not sure I have enough to make the smaller size.  Plus I found a bright pink shade of the yarn she used for the pattern that I fell in love with.  But since I’m supposed to be on a fiber diet I stopped short of cashing out.  Gifts are permissible so I’m hoping someone asks me what I want, because I’m prepared for a change. 

Slow Progress

​It’s painfully slow going on Jo’s sweater, but I’m making some progress every day.  It’s not going to be done this week like I had hoped, but my new project is going to be the C2C Throw kit that I got from We Crochet instead of another sweater like I was originally thinking.  And I also want to work a bunch on Courtney’s Temperature Afghan. I don’t think I’ve touched it since Christmas when I started spinning again. My 10 day vacation has officially started and I’m psyched to have time at home to work on my projects uninterrupted if I want to.  We have some staycation ideas for things to do, but Rochester NY is no Walt Disney World.  Especially in Jan/Feb.  One of the things I like to do while knitting is listen to books or videos but I’ve been in a rut lately. Maybe this week I will be able to find something interesting to watch or listen to amount the pile of apps and streaming services my family requires me to subscribe to.  

Pi Complete

 ​I finished binding off my Pi Shawl after work on Monday night.  I was so thrilled to have it done and the ends woven in all at once. I need to block it this week when I can pin it to the mattress and leave it to dry completely.  

So, tonight I’m up at 2:30am desperately surfing yarn sites and my pattern library for my next new project. I started my C2C throw kit I got from WeCrochet.com before Christmas, but I’m really looking to work on another garment like one of Joji Locatelli’s sweaters.  I priced out yarn and had to put on the brakes. I will need to shop my stash for the next project, which shouldn’t be too difficult.  In the meantime I have Jo’s sweater to work on. I got the second piece moved over to my new size 8 Prym needle so hopefully it will work up quicker than it was on that dreadful Susan Bates Crystal torture device. ;) 

Later today I’m planning to give a couple of my supposedly machine washable sweaters a bath. The jury is still out on one that I’m not sure what type of yarn I used and one that I’ve confirmed is hand wash only.  Might save those for another day.  I’ve been knitting for over 20 years and have never washed a wool anything except to felt it. Now I’m scared.  But there are these 2 I’m fairly confident can be washed on Gentle so I’m willing to give it a chance. 

Missed my target

​Well, it’s 12:16am and I still have 100 stitches left of my Pi Shawl to border & bind-off.  I will be able to finish that later this morning after I get some sleep I hope.  I came home from work and worked on it while watching the Bills game.  What a letdown at the last second. Then I put on When Harry Met Sally and kept knitting my 8 stitch border. When that was done I turned on Pride & Prejudice. Now I have calmed down enough from the anxiety of the game and can hopefully fall asleep.  I still haven’t contemplated what my new project will be after Jo’s sweater. After work tomorrow I will try to shop my stash and come up with something. 

Edging Progress

​Today I managed to get about 126 stitches bound off with the knitted-on border. I came home from work at 9:30 and put on When Harry Met Sally and knit away.  I decided after getting a good section bound off that I really wanted to be able to track progress. I went back and placed stitch markers every 50 stitches so I would know how much was left to work.  

We are predicted to have temps in the single digits this weekend so I plan to spend Saturday and when I’m not at work on Sunday on this project so I can hopefully have this shawl off the needles by the end of the weekend. Then I will be able to get back to Jo’s Big Comfy Sweater now that I have 2 of the good Prym needles.  That’s mindless knitting. Just miles of stockinette to the armpits then a ridge pattern for a long bit. I wish I had the patience to redesign the pattern to be worked in the round. But I don’t have the patience for that. Plus it would work against the easy design of 2 T shaped pieces sewn together into a sweater without a front or back. 

I want to be done with that project this coming week if possible so I can do something completely new & different while I’m on my staycation starting on Friday.  

I’m not sure what I will choose.  Something easy and portable or something complex that requires concentration? I have the C2C crochet afghan kit, I have multiple Caron Cakes in different materials that might be another afghan or another sweater.  Or a new pair of socks with the yarn I picked up at Hobby Lobby. I will have to ponder my options this week while I’m busy knitting another few miles of 8 stitch wide border on the Pi Shawl. 

Winning on my day off…

​Well, Wednesday was a good day.  I spun some in the evening for the first time in a few days.  I may need to go back and spin more on my first bobbin after seeing how much I’ve got on the second bobbin and how much top I still have left to spin.  

I also got done with my last lace rounds of my Pi Shawl and am down to the last 4-5 rounds of plain knitting before adding the border.  So exciting!  

My replacement Prym circular arrived yesterday and Hooray it was a real size 8 5mm this time!  I was really afraid that I was going to get another size 11 8mm needle.  

Monday was my dad’s 72nd birthday and I got him a new Chromebook. He had one that couldn’t be kept up to date any longer because it was so old.  He uses the thing like crazy. And I got a good deal on it too. I was tempted to buy myself one but since I have a 1 year old MacBook Air what do I possibly need a Chromebook for? My hoarder tendency was luckily squashed. 

Plans for the day off

 Tomorrow I have the day off and I plan to do a good bit of knitting and spinning while I'm home.  The Pi Shawl is getting heavy in a good way.  I've finished row 37 on the 576 stitch section.  Only 11 or 12 more rounds to go.  Then I get to knit on the border, which I expect to be tedious and time consuming.  I just know it will be a relief to finish such a massive project.  Then onto Jo's Big Comfy Sweater.  My correct needle should arrive tomorrow, I hope.  Then I will be able to speed along on both the front and back of her sweater with my ergonomic needles.  

I also want to finish spinning up the BFL wool so that I can ply it this weekend when I have my next day off.  Then I will be able to start spinning some of the other fibers I bought.  If I feel like I've gotten enough of a hang of it, I might do one of the colored rovings or maybe even try one of the batts.  The goal is to get thru the bag of BFL first.  

This morning I ordered more lotion from Happy Hands Store on Etsy.  I love the Bohemian and Apricot & Honey scents.  Now I will have big enough bottles that I won't be afraid to use it all up in my little 1oz tottle bottles.  The smell stays on your skin, not on your knitting.  And my hands get dry from all the alcohol and gloves I have to wear at work doing covid testing.  I will be able to bring some to work to use during the day and have plenty at home to use when knitting or spinning and my hands get rough. 

Nearly Heart Failure

 ​So, tonight I had to work kind of late (8pm) and when I got home I immediately put on my PJs and got started knitting on my Pi Shawl.  We’re nearing the home stretch and I can’t wait for this project to be completed.  I knit one and a half rounds before ball 3 ran out and I struggled to find the bag with the rest of my Einband yarn.  It was located eventually under my bed. So I sat down to start the new ball and tugged the project and didn’t notice that an edge was under my jar of pretzels (gotta have snacks when knitting, right?)  off flew a whole repeat worth of stitches!  I wanted to cry. Or throw up.  Or both.  I grabbed my double pointed sock needles and attempted to catch the stitches but it seemed impossible. I ended up moving my right hand suddenly and off popped another half of a repeat.  I wanted to throw the whole project across the room.  I grabbed the stitches I could. I turned back the pattern to the previous row to see what the dropped stitches should look like. I somehow managed to tink back to the point where I yanked the second group of stitches off the needle and was able to successfully reknit and breathed a sigh or relief when I got to the end of the round. For the record, rounds 29 & 30 are now done. I still plan to go to round 48 or 49.

While I was searching for my yarn, I did finally locate my Jan-June planner that had gone missing in December.  Better late than never. I’m using 3 planners for different purposes.  The found one is an Erin Condren Daily Duo that I keep track of my work schedule and how my work day goes. On the days I have off I write down what I did on the hourly format so I feel better about what I managed to accomplish.  My Hobonichi Weeks Mega is my main planner that I write everything down in and use the back pages for bullet journal collections, patterns, project notes, etc.  And my Hobonichi Weeks Sneaker is used as a meal tracker and daily gratitude log.  My B6 Stalogy has been relegated to a journal this year although I do miss having that as my planner.  Daksina is such an inspiration.  I love to watch her transform a plain notebook into something beautiful and functional.  

We are expecting a substantial snow storm here in western New York.  I don’t get the luxury of a snow day unfortunately. But I am looking forward to my 10 day WecantgotoDisneyWorldButImnotgoingtowork vacation coming up on the 28th.  I really want to be done with this shawl before then and maybe even get Jo’s sweater done or nearly done so I can spin while I’m home that week. I have some beautiful wool fiber that I don’t dare take out of the package because I still need to finish up my Blue-Faced Leicester and ply it into yarn before I try spinning anything else. 

And lastly, I need to finish reading my favorite author’s latest book, Prodigal Son by Jay Crownover. Normally I devour her books in one session, but these characters have mental health issues that are hitting close to home and I have to take it slow so I don’t get overwhelmed. 

Progressing nicely on Pi Shawl

​Today I finished the first of two repeats of diamonds on my Pi Shawl.  I also re-read the pattern and decided to end the shawl with 49 rounds before attaching the border.  I’m looking forward to finishing this project soon, hopefully this week for the shawl body and another week for the tedious border.  Of the 49 rounds in this final section, I am on round 29.  Then I will probably have to leave it until spring to block it somewhere outdoors since I don’t have a good 8’x8’ space to spread it out. I’m pretty sure it’s bigger than my king size bed top. 

My Amazon order came in this week and when I opened it today I discovered my #8 needle was in fact a size 11. So I reported it to Amazon and requested they send me another. Hopefully the second time I get the right thing but my expectations aren’t that high since I have a feeling that the pile probably all got mislabeled like when I ordered a $149 pen and got the wrong one twice.   I also ordered a Big Sully yarn caddy that isn’t nearly big enough for the yarns I use. 

I really want to do some writing or journaling with my new fountain pen but can’t really think of anything to say. At least nothing nice.  So far I bitched about the lack of thanks from the Christmas gifts I bought some people this year.  Next year I will not be generous to those people, that’s for sure. 

Pi Shawl Progress

 So far I’m about to complete my 2nd ball of laceweight Icelandic wool on my Pi Shawl from Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Knitter’s Almanac.  I’ve knit to the point that I’ve increased the final time to 576 stitches around and knit 9 rounds so far on that many stitches.  I’ve mapped out the shawl in my planner and seem to come up with 45 rounds instead of the 48 I would expect.  After that comes the knitted on border that will be slow and painful I’m sure, being that you have to knit a row for every stitch you bind off.  

Contemplating that I would need a longer needle once I doubled the stitches from 288 to 576, I bought a Kollage square soft needle from Paradise Fibers. It is a dud for this project because the yarn is firm and the needle cable is soft.  I might use it on the silk/mohair yarn but it’s no match for the Icelandic wool.  I put the project back on my Denise needles after a round or maybe 2. I was afraid that I would tug too hard to move the stitches and pull the needle right off the cable and end up with a $20 piece of trash.  

I haven’t been doing much spinning this weekend or week thus far. Maybe tomorrow and definitely when I have the day off on Wednesday I will try to finish spinning my 2nd bobbin of singles to attempt to ply.  My time on the School of SweetGeorgia is counting down and I am stuck at the homework right now. 

I had to rejoin Twitter because my favorite YouTuber for knitting gave up YouTube. My favorite YouTuber for writing/notebook hoarding is my age which I was shocked to discover. It’s been a random week already.