by Kat | Dec 8, 2017 | General
The knitting marches on, albeit slowly. However, today I am going to share a bit of a preview about my 2018 Stitching Project, which will begin on December 21 and I am taking a bit of license from Vivaldi and borrowing his Four Seasons. There will be four much larger stitching projects; Winter, Spring, Summer, and Autumn. And, while they will still be free-hand stitching – no drawing out of my design, the season of stitches will all be the same motif, but will change color as the season does.
I have also been wondering how handspun yarn would work to use for stitching, so I have been playing with some fiber to create some “crayons” to stitch with. I will test this out before hand to see how I like it. I am not the best at spinning super fine yarns, so I am not sure that this will work as I am envisioning it. But, I am going to do some experimenting swatching and see what it looks like over the weekend and I will share my results back here on Monday.
Now, how about some links???
That is all I have for this week, have a great weekend – stay warm! I will see you back here on Monday!
by Kat | Dec 7, 2017 | General, Words
This week it is all about powerful things:
Thing 1: Wind
My cousin posted this on FB and I have watched it a number of times.
Thing 2: Voices
Thing 3: Fire
I don’t know if you all saw this, but holy cow – scary! To my friends that live in Southern CA, please be safe!
If you need more things today, head on over to Carole’s and see what others had to say!
by Kat | Dec 6, 2017 | General, Unraveled Wednesday
This week there was a bit of unraveling and a careful bit of unknitting. Sigh.
The unraveling bit involved my Peace Train knitting. Right pattern but wrong yarn? Or perhaps, it was the wrong pattern for the right yarn. Thus, my Peace Train Knitting has a definite Decemberist vibe now. And, the fabric is much nicer. I will be on the lookout for some wonderful fingering weight yarn to use for the Peace Shawl, but that won’t be my focus this December.
The unknitting was entirely my fault. One would think if the pattern author took all this time to lay out super clear instructions for short row shaping, including making sure you have different markers so you don’t mess up, that well, I wouldn’t mess up! However, apparently, I can’t follow instructions multiple times in a row correctly, so I am tinking back to fix my mistake. I should be back on track shortly, and then sleeve division. (Really, I am blaming this mistake on Outlander – I should have been Decemberist Peace Knitting not keep track of where you are in a pattern knitting!) I am sure you will get sick of updates on this sweater before it is finished, so I promise to share a different view next week! (Hopefully!!)
Now for the reading!
In the finished category:
- Bury Your Dead with Armande Gamache and I LOVED it. I gave it 5 stars and highly recommend this series.
- Never Caught. It was a quick listen and I enjoyed it. It is a fascinating story and I learned things I did not know. It is incredibly well told and amazing frank. My opinion of George and Martha Washington has diminished greatly after this book. If you love history, you will enjoy this book. I gave it 4-stars.
- Simply Clean. I had hoped for some amazing motivation in this book, but really, there was none. The idea of “just pick up after yourself” is great (I mean who does not know this already????) but the concepts do not at all seem logical. Her 10 minutes might work if you live by yourself in a studio apartment, in a real house it seems highly illogical. I gave it 2-stars.
Currently reading:
The Hundred-year-old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared…a suggestion from Mary and I am loving it. I am almost halfway through and hope to be done this week.
Up Next:
- Sing, Unburied, Sing.
- Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance
- Bonfire
What are you reading right now? And, thank you for joining us today!
by Kat | Dec 5, 2017 | General
Bare-armed sentinels
Rain and winds that blow and swirl
Even the first snow
by Kat | Dec 4, 2017 | General, In This Moment
December seems to be starting off quite nicely, especially weather wise… as crazy as this will sound, we have had glorious sunny days all weekend (and most of last week!) with temps well into the 50’s! This mild weather seems quite surreal and it is such a treat to have the windows open to let in the fresh air! I know that winter will soon return and with it cold temps, but I am enjoying this weather right now tremendously!
The weekend was productive, there was some Swedish Death Cleaning, some reading, a tiny bit of knitting, and some football watching.
There was also a bit of Christmas decorating, which is modest this year in comparison to years past. It feels right though, and while I have just a couple more things I might get out, this scaled back decorating is a welcome change. Decorating with a thought to having to un-decorate it all in January seems a better use of precious time.
My list today is not too horrendous, but a big thing on my list this week (and for the next 3 weeks) is to work on some plans for 2018! I know, it seems so adult of me! LOL But, I think that spending some time plotting out what I’d like the year to bring is a wise move and it might bring a more productive year. We shall see!
And, so this Monday is starting out quite nicely, here is to a wonderful week for us all!
